CaliMusician

I'm not gonna lie, I'm pretty down right now. Thankfully, I have no booze to make me even more down. I guess that's something to be thankful for this year.

I'm thankful I made it to see 27. What a terrible thing to have to say, but I am.

I do have two family members who still talk to me...

This is kind of a stupid thread, but I guess I need some obvious other things to be thankful for (e.g. freedom). My mind is in a fog right now with depression, so it's hard to see the simple things in front of me.

What are simple things you are thankful for this year, that I can be too?

sobriiestote

I don't normally do the gratitude thing but I actually said it out loud driving to work this morning so I'll share with you what I said to myself;

Thank you for me being sober today.
Thank you for my wonderful children.
Thank you for my husband, who although extremely difficult to live with, often does try his best.
Thank you for my family.
Thank you for where I live, a village I love.
Thank you for my job, only a small part time one but it's OK.

And then the end one which is probably the biggest of all.

Thank you for letting me live in a part of the world that is at peace, something I take for granted every single day.

Try your own : )

MythOfSisyphus

At a minimum I am thankful to be alive, and here on Earth at this moment in time. I'm grateful I stopped the free fall I was in while I drank. It would have been better to have quit sooner but it is what it is. I'm thankful that I am pretty healthy despite decades of abusing my body with booze. I'm glad I can still work and live my life well day to day.

Marcher13

CaliMusician gratitude has been a mainstay of my recovery. Over in the Daily threads you'll find a variety of threads you can post in on gratitude.

What can we be thankful for? Well ...

I'm grateful for the dinner I ate while ago-- good fresh food and the company of my DH and elderly Mum.
And I'm grateful for both of them and for my little dog and my cat
And the full moon that is shining tonight.
I'm grateful that my annual break is on the horizon and that tomorrow is a Wednesday and I have a job to go to.
I'm grateful that I put the last stitch in a blanket tonight.
I'm grateful for all the customers who came into our shop today and for the way the sun shone.
And I'm incredibly grateful for all of you here at SR.

Dee74

I'm grateful all my problems are first world ones...but most of all I'm grateful to be alive.

Really grateful, not in an abstract way but a really concrete sense of joy.

Thats the thing that gets new every morning, and it never gets old for me, because I really should not be here.

Every day is a chance to do something I might have otherwise never got the chance to do.

D

Soberwolf

Have you spoken to a Dr about depression Cali

zombob

I'm thankful for the sun each day and arise early to join the birds. They chirp a lot and I check in here. I'm not feeling so gung-ho either but I do know from countless experiences that a drink would only extend and compound my funk. I will ride it out bc the solar system just keeps giving me these days and they're not guaranteed forever. Better to make hay while the sun is shinin'. It's only a now moment and there are plenty more just around the corner. Peace.

MIRecovery

I am thankful that I have the chance to live a better life and move in a positive direction. When I was drinking each day got worse and I was in a death spiral.

It did not happen over night but each day I didn't drink things got a tiny bit better

entropy1964

The holidays are hard because everyone is asking me 'what are you doing?' 'are you cooking?'. And I'm listening to everyone (this is mostly at yoga because I have no real friends) talk of all the multiple options they have for the holidays. When I tell people I'm staying home alone the looks on people's faces are, well, um, awkward. I thought of lying but why bother. I actually don't care.

There are always things to be thankful for. My health, what's left of my mind, my daughter, my dogs, my stupid cat, netflix (oh god I'm digging deep here) oh and yoga. I choose to be happy. I have to. For me happiness really is a choice.

biminiblue

Hot running water is always at the very top of my gratitude list

FreeOwl

There's a magical bubble
Flying through an infinite vacuum
Warmed and illuminated by an imaginably-hot ball of fire
All of which may or may not be a wizard's dream
It hangs in the cold, cold darkness
Surrounded by a billion billion heaving bursting explosions
Whirling and expanding into endless nothingness
And inside that bubble
A billion billion expressions of being
All twisting and swirling and heaving and dancing
Breathing and expanding, flying and crawling
A madcap mayhem of magical impossibility
All of it contingent on a billion billion unlikelihoods

And you get to open those windows you call eyes
You get to walk your bare and wondrous feet across it
You have the chance to see and feel and hear and smell and taste it
Here you are
Just hurtling through this vast unimaginable unlikely incredibleness
You can lift up your voice and scream
In joy, in wonder, in amazement, in fear or glory or pleading beauty
You are YOU.... right smack in the incredible amazing middle of this
You have this, right now, this moment
And you can spread your arms wide and just LOVE it for all the
Absolutely
Impossibly
Magically
Improbably
Unrealistically
Unreasonably
Insanely
Fantastical
Wonderifical incredible damn GLORY that it is!!!

Hell, if that's not something to be thankful for, I donno what to say...

Nowsthetime

One of my daughter's classmates has a six year old brother who is dying of leukemia... Nothing can be done.

Maybe that will give you some perspective...

Marcher13

CaliMusician one of the best things about gratitude is that it builds on itself. Looking for things to be grateful for is not playing Pollyanna, it actually opens our hearts and minds.

Look at the day you've just had and consider what was good or hopeful or made you smile -- even a little.

MIRecovery

Can relate to that one. My daughter died from cancer a little over a year ago. What I wouldn't give to have her alive and well. Even with her loss I am grateful for the people I love who are still here.

I made it through 1.5 years of agony but never lost sight of what I have not what was taken from me. Plus I did it sober

sobriiestote

That's amazing, where's it from?!

Soberwolf

Check in Cali

CaliMusician

So is my mom.

Maybe that will give you some perspective.



...and to Soberwolf, how does that have to do with anything here? This isn't a doctor forum. I don't see how that part is any of your business. I thought this was about sobriety.

CaliMusician

This is why I don't ever post anywhere, or talk to anyone in public. Everyone's just ruthless and ridiculous. Seriously. I'm out...27 was long enough anyway

Dee74

I think when you said 'my mind is in a fog right now with depression', an obvious response from most of us 'is have you seen a Dr'.

Noone was trying to get all up in your face, making an accusation, or trying get into your business - we're all just trying to help.

I hope you'll decide to stick around, but I wish you well whatever you decide

D

Fly N Buy

This is about a kinship of suffering with a foundation of shared experience, strength and hope. Sobriety for many then recovery for those who are teachable.

Around 6 months of no alcohol or drugs the fog in my brain lifted. I could see things much differently and began to accept that hardship is the pathway to peace.

Best of luck